Both governments then proceeded to bury their heads in the sand, ignore all the faults and hope that everything would work itself out.

The British government thought that the nationalists resident in the six northern counties would be integrated into the unionist community and peace would follow. But bigotry and gerrymandering by the unionist elite, in their bid to keep power, made it impossible for this to happen, and non-unionists found full participation in the state unattainable.

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